michael kors a battle that offered hope

a battle that offered hope
"We've been hidden in the clouds for 60 years," said Keith Norrish, as clouds crept up the Kokoda Valley, clinging to the towering mountainsides.
Mr Norrish had come to remote Papua New Guinea with nine other veterans of the 1942 Kokoda campaign, in which 1500 michael kors perfume Australian soldiers fought more than 14,000 Japanese and helped turn around World War II.
With them was Prime Minister John Howard and his Papua New Guinea counterpart, Michael Somare. Yesterday they unveiled a long-awaited memorial marking the 60th anniversary of the Kokoda campaign and honouring the Australians and Papua New Guineans who fought there.
The official party arrived in army Chinook and Black Hawk helicopters. They were greeted by men and women from the Isurava tribe. Warriors beat drums. The tribespeople shouted: "Howard! Howard! Howard!"
Locals hope the memorial, built by the Australian Government, will attract young Australians seeking to pay tribute to the soldiers who fought and, in many cases, died there. Said chieftain Ivan Nitua: "The blood of our people is mixed in the earth of my land forever."
An emotional Mr Howard said he hoped the memorial would become "a magnet for young Australians, like other places, like Gallipoli".
More than 400 Australian soldiers were lost in the Kokoda campaign.
"It was not a battle fought with huge armies, it was not a battle that was ultimately won because of a set-piece strategy," said Mr Howard. "It was ultimately won because of the aggregation of individual acts of courage.
"Today we honour not only those Australian soldiers who gave their lives, but we also honour those people of Papua New Guinea, who at great risk to themselves, assisted the soldiers of the Australian Army.
"The people of Papua New Guinea claimed by those deeds a place in the Australian heart which will never be removed. Together, in the most atrocious fighting conditions along this track, they turned around the course of World War II."
The Kokoda battles had, he said, "injected hope and heart" into an Australia fearing invasion by the Japanese.
The memorial, at the northern end of the Kokoda Trail, is dug into a hillside where young Australians fought for their lives for four days in August, 1942. Wounded and diseased, the men of the 39th and 2/14th Battalions fought hand to hand to keep the Japanese at bay.
Col Blume, a private in the Kokoda campaign, described yesterday how he and the 31 others in his platoon had fought off the Japanese attacks.
On August 30, they counted more than 200 enemy bodies in front of their position. His commander, Harold Bisset, was hit by machinegun fire. Mr Blume carried him out of the line of fire, only to watch him die in toms wedges the arms of his younger brother.
Mr Blume remembers with awe the deeds of lululemon athletica Private Bruce Kingsbury, who was awarded the Victoria Cross for his actions at Kokoda. By noon on the fourth day, the enemy was set to capture the 2/14th headquarters - opening the entire Kokoda Trail before them.
On the spot where Australia has erected four black marble obelisks marked "courage, endurance, mateship, sacrifice" the Japanese had finally broken through Australian lines with nothing between them and Port Moresby.
Private Kingsbury grabbed a Bren gun from a fallen colleague and raced into heavy machinegun fire, shouting, "Follow me! We can turn them back." He mowed down more than 30 Japanese, forcing them into retreat, but was felled by a single shot to his chest from a sniper.
Papua was the first defeat of the Imperial Japanese australialouisvuitton2013.net/ Army, said Australian War Memorial principal historian Dr Peter Stanley. "Like toms outlet online Midway and Coral Sea, it turned them around, it turned around the land war in the Pacific."
Mr Norrish sees Kokoda michaelkorsstoreinuk.webs.com/ as the "greatest fighting withdrawal in the history of the Australian army". It is a retreat he is lucky to have made, having had four machinegun bullets ricochet at close range off a steel mirror in his shirt pocket. "Without it, it would have taken the heart, the lot," he recalled yesterday.
With three bullets lodged in his stomach, one in his chest and another in his arm, Mr Norrish spent five days walking the muddy track before reaching safety.
He said the importance of Kokoda had never been given credence. "I think everyone wanted to get on with their lives. We are very proud to be part of it. We never sought reward, but reward is what we are getting today."
So, too, is Mr Blume gratified to see those who did michealkorsinca2013.webs.com/ not return remembered. "I feel a lot more satisfied to see this memorial. I feel it's done something for their honour. They were mates."
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